Concerns grow for hiker missing in Spain

Wendy Simm paid tribute to the efforts of search and rescue teams who have mounted a major operation to find her husband, Gordon, since he vanished at the weekend. Speaking to the Yorkshire Post from her hotel in Spain, Mrs Simm, who is from Kirkbymoorside in North Yorkshire, also spoke of her ongoing heartache as fears mount for her husband’s safety.

“Throughout the whole of this, everyone has been absolutely fantastic from the British Consulate to the police and the search and rescue teams,” she said.

“We have been told we have to try and rest in the evening, but everyone is just so stressed as we simply do not know what has happened.”

Mr Simm, 63, who is an experienced walker, left his wife at their hotel at Nerja, east of Malaga, on Saturday morning.

He told her he planned to spend a day-and-a-half on a straight route of about 12 miles across the Sierra Almijara mountains just behind the popular resort and back.

Mrs Simm raised the alarm after her husband failed to return by Sunday evening.

The couple had been due to return to the UK on Tuesday, but their daughter, Deborah McCloud, has now flown out to join her mother while the search continues.

The paramilitary civil guard, including its mountain rescue unit, fire crews and civil protection personnel backed-up by a helicopter, resumed the search at first light yesterday. It is due to continue today.

Mr Simm, who is a semi-retired engineer, is also an author and keen photographer. He moved to North Yorkshire with his family in the early 1980s. He has had books published about walks along the Cleveland Way and Hadrian’s Wall.